Posts Tagged ‘US international standing’

In every developed nation on Earth save the US, education and health have been acknowledged as basic human rights throughout living memory.

The next President and his party are sweeping the elections because they want to bring the United States up to the standards of the civilized world, and prevent the US from falling further behind and winding up as a third world country – a fate the Bush administration has gone a *long* way to bringing down on us.

Why do I say Bush has driven the US toward ‘third world” status? Huge debts, a weak currency, economic meltdowns brought on by corruption and unbridled greed, huge inequities between rich and poor, increased teen pregnancy and drop-out rates, incompetent responses to natural disasters, squandering a once-mighty international reputation, using lies to launch a baseless and incompetently planned war which distracts the people from monumental government corruption and the routine violation of their constitutional rights to privacy… these are all classic hallmarks of a second-rate, third-world country.

If we don’t change course immediately and profoundly, that slide will become irreversible. If the British and Soviet empires fell, we can too. Educating our children, and raising the standard of living while reducing recidivism at the workplace (both effects of adequate healthcare) will begin the process of America regaining its place in the civilized world (and its economic power, while we’re at it). Hiring workers educated and kept healthy with government help is no more socialist than trucking goods on the interstates built by Republican President Eisenhower.

But if it makes you happy to label that “socialist” then knock yourself out. I’d rather live in a “socialist” country – like Britain or Germany or Sweden or Japan or South Korea or Canada – than a cut-throat “third world” country – like Iran or Pakistan or Bangladesh or Russia or Rep of Congo or Nigeria or Columbia or Mexico.

Please note: the countries on both lists have elected presidents/primeministers, and I’m not picking on the people who live there. The difference is that one group has a civilized system that works, the other has a dysfunctional mess. The choice is stark. Americans, which category do you want us to be in? your children and grandchildren will live with your choice.